Anastasia Rosen-Jones (formally Marcia E. Rosen), New Horizons Small “Zones Of Peace” Project Executive Director and Founder.
A personal and professional blog exploring the vision behind the New
Horizons ZOP and how it reflects my journey from blindness to recovery.

Finding Light in the Darkness

Anastasia Rosen-Jones

Anastasia Rosen-Jones (formerly Marcia E. Rosen) is a retired psychotherapist with more than thirty-five years in the mental health field. Now a community development and violence prevention coach, consultant and trainer, she is the author of five books in progress, including "The Middle East Crisis In My Backyard" and numerous articles.

Anastasia makes her home in the mountains above Harpers Ferry where she is happily nested with the birds, the trees and the squirrels. She is at her most fulfilled watching the sunset from the deck of her home -- and/or -- sitting around a campfire in the woods telling and listening to stories.

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Saturday, June 2, 2012

To See Or Not To See

To hear or not to hear, to see or not to see, to say or not to say; all of this can be a challenge. To be whole and truthful and carry goodness in your heart and, then, out into the world, is not always easy; to know the right thing to do.

It was so costly
not to see.

I have been tested, once again, by the enormity of following this path, each and every day of my life, as I live it today, having formerly paid my dues by doing otherwise. That kind of facing up to life was what I carried with me on my vacation as I yearned, wholeheartedly, to find the highest truths of my heart. The teachings of Murat’s tradition call it Marjah, I understand this to mean the reflection of the Divine as it is within the Self, a state not so easily come by.

H.D. Johns, my first clinical trainer, long deceased, pointed out to a group of trainees, of which I was a part, that deciding whether or not a particular action is one of co-dependency (i.e. caretaking others in a way that deprives both oneself and others of their wholeness), rather than being genuinely caring and, thus, life-affirming, is a tricky kind of thing.

He told us that choosing which way to go can sometimes be as comfortable as sitting on the very head of a pin. And, said, H.D. to a room full of eager new psychotherapists, “I hope you never get off of it.”

Moral of the story: Never believe you can be certain as to the best choices to make when it comes to how you care for others (and yourself).

Of course, H.D. was right, I have come to understand this lesson well. It is often the hottest of those trials by fire. So, earnestly seeking my Marjah, I was challenged about certain choices I believed I needed to make, as executive director of New Horizons and the designer and chief implementer of our Possible Human, Possible Society Study, as I vacationed and then returned.

I pondered and I pondered. I sought counsel from the most able I could find. I hope I chose wisely and with care and compassion. As I have said, again and again, recently, referring to our recent Abkhazian Dinner event with its array of teachable moments; the good, the bad and the ugly, this event brought New Horizons to a turning point. Event became process without our needing to do more than our planned presentation up against the backdrop of our Possible Human, Possible Society Study and a most interesting selection of guests.

I made the best leadership choices I could manage out of circumstances as they presented themselves, hearing, seeing and speaking truth in the most caring ways I could discern. So I state, once more --

“We will never see the end of what began …. but we will always remember where our adventure originated.”